LETTERS 


TO 


ROBERT   SOUTHEY. 


LETTERS 

FKOM 

PERCY  BYSSHE  SHELLEY 

TO 

ROBERT    SOUTHEY, 

AND     OTHER     CORRESPONDENTS. 


1886. 

New  York  :  Privately  Printed, 

[,Not  for  Sale.) 


"  Most  of  the  qualities  of  a  good  letter-writer  were 
combined  in  Shelley ^  and  Fortune  also  favoured  the 

development  of  his  genius  in  this  direction If 

that  age  [the  nineteenth  century\  had  any  master  of 
epistolary  composition  among  its  wonderful  poets^  it 
•was  Shelley  :  Shelley  or  none." 


SHELLEY'S   LETTERS. 

LETTER    I. 

To  Robert  Southey. 

Messrs.  Longdill  &  Co., 
5,  Gray's  Inn  Square, 
March  'jth,  1816. 

My  dear  Sir, 

I  cannot  refrain  from  presenting  you 
with  a  little  poem  [Alastor],  the  product 
of  a  few  serene  hours  of  the  last  beauti- 
ful autumn.  I  shall  never  forget  the 
pleasure  which  I  derived  from  your 
conversation,  or  the  kindness  with 
which  I  was  received  in  your  hospit- 
able circle  during  the  short  period  of 
my  stay  in  Cumberland  some  years 
ago.     The    disappointment    of    some 


4         SHELLEY'S  LETTERS, 

youthful  hopes,  and  subsequent  mis- 
fortunes of  a  heavier  nature,  are  all 
that  I  can  plead  as  my  excuse  for 
neglecting  to  write  to  you,  as  I  had 
promised,  from  Ireland.  The  true 
weight  of  this  apology  you  cannot 
know.  Let  it  be  sufficient  that,  re- 
garding you  with  admiration  as  a  poet, 
and  with  respect  as  a  man,  I  send  you, 
as  an  intimation  of  those  sentiments, 
my  first  serious  attempt  to  interest  the 
best  feeHngs  of  the  human  heart,  be- 
lieving that  you  have  so  much  general 
charity  as  to  forget,  like  me,  how  widely 
in  moral  and  political  opinions  we  dis- 
agree, and  to  attribute  that  difference 
to  better  motives  than  the  multitude 
are  disposed  to  allege  as  the  cause  of 
dissent  from  their  institutions. 
Very  sincerely  yours, 

Percy  B.  Shelley. 


SHELLEY'S  LETTERS, 


LETTER  11. 
To  Robert  Southey. 

Pisa, 
June  261/1,  1820. 

Dear  Sir, 

Some  friends  of  mine  persist  in 
affirming  that  you  are  the  author  of  a 
criticism  which  appeared  some  time 
since  in  the  Quarterly  Review  on  the 
Revolt  of  Islam. 

I  know  nothing  that  would  give  me 
more  sincere  pleasure  than  to  be  able.to 
affirm  from  your  own  assurance  that  you 
were  not  guilty  of  that  writing,  I  con- 
fess I  see  such  strong  internal  evidence 
against  the  charge,  without  reference 
to  what  I  think  I  know  of  the  generous 
sensibility  of  your  character,  that  had 


6         SHELLEY S  I^ETTERS. 

my  own  conviction  only  been  con- 
cerned, I  should  never  have  troubled 
you  to  deny  what  I  firmly  believe  you 
would  have  spurned  to  do. 

Our  short  personal  intercourse  has 
always  been  remembered  by  me  with 
pleasure ;  and  when  I  recalled  the 
enthusiasm  with  which  I  then  con- 
sidered your  writings,  with  gratitude  for 
your  notice,  we  parted,  I  think,  with 
feelings  of  mutual  kindness.  The 
article  in  question,  except  in  reference 
to  the  possibility  of  its  having  been 
written  by  you,  is  not  worth  a  moment's 
attention. 

That  an  unprincipled  hireling,  in 
default  of  what  to  answer  in  a  published 
composition,  should,  without  provoca- 
tion, insult  over  the  domestic  calamities 
of  a  writer  of  the  adverse  party — to 
which  perhaps  their  victim  dares  scarce- 
ly advert  in  thought — that  he  should 
make  those  calamities  the  theme  of  the 
foulest  and  the  falsest  slander — that  all 


SHELLEY'S  LETTERS.         7 

this  should  be  done  by  a  calumniator 
without  a  name — with  the  cowardice, 
no  less  than  the  malignity,  of  an  as- 
sassin— is  too  common  a  piece  of 
charity  among  Christians  (Christ  would 
have  taught  them  better),  too  common 
a  violation  of  what  is  due  from  man  to 
man  among  the  pretended  friends  of 
social  order,  to  have  drawn  one  remark 
from  me,  but  that  I  would  have  you 
observe  the  arts  practised  by  that  party 
for  which  you  have  abandoned  the 
cause  to  which  your  early  writings  were 
devoted.  I  had  intended  to  have  called 
on  you,  for  the  purpose  of  saying  what 
I  now  write,  on  my  return  to  England ; 
but  the  wretched  state  of  my  health 
detains  me  here,  and  I  fear  leaves  my 
enemy,  were  he  such  as  I  could  deign 
to  contend  with,  an  easy,  but  a  base 
victory,  for  I  do  not  profess  paper 
warfare.  But  there  is  a  time  for  all 
things. 

I  regret  to  say  that  I  shall  consider 


8         SHELLEY'S  LETTERS. 

your  neglecting  to  answer  this  letter  a 
substantiation  of  the  fact  which  it  is  in- 
tended to  settle — and  therefore  I  shall 
assuredly  hear  from  you. 

Dear  sir,  accept  the  best  wishes  of 
Yours  truly. 
P.  B.  Shelley. 


SHELLEY'S  LETTERS.         9 

LETTER     III. 

To  Robert  Southey. 

Pisa, 

August  I'jth,  1820. 

Dear  Sir, 

Allow  me  to  acknowledge  the  sincere 
pleasure  which  I  received  from  the  first 
paragraph  of  your  letter.  The  dis- 
avowal it  contained  was  just  such  as  I 
firmly  anticipated. 

Allow  me  also  to  assure  you,  that  no 
menace  implied  in  my  letter  could 
have  the  remotest  application  to  your- 
self. I  am  net  indeed  aware  that  it 
contained  any  menace.  I  recollect 
expressing  what  contempt  I  felt,  in  the 
hope  that  you  might  meet  the  wretched 
hireling  who  has  so  closely  imitated 
your  style  as  to  deceive  all  but  those 
who  knew  you  into  a  beUef  that  he 


lo  SHELLEY'S  LETTERS. 

was  you,  at  Murray's,  or  somewhere, 
and  that  you  would  inflict  my  letter  on 
him,  as  a  recompense  for  sowing  ill-will 
between  those  who  wish  each  other  all 
good,  as  you  and  I  do. 

I  confess  your  recommendation  to 
adopt  the  system  of  ideas  you  call 
Christianity  has  little  weight  with  me, 
whether  you  mean  the  popular  super- 
stition in  all  its  articles,  or  some  more 
refined  theory  with  respect  to  those 
events  and  opinions  which  put  an  end 
to  the  graceful  religion  of  the  Greeks. 
To  judge  of  the  doctrines  by  their 
effects,  one  would  think  that  this 
religion  were  called  the  religion  of 
Christ  and  Charity,  ut  lucus  a  non 
lucendo,  when  I  consider  the  manner 
in  which  they  seem  to  have  transformed 
the  disposition  and  understanding  of 
you  and  men  of  the  most  amiable 
manners  and  the  highest  accomplish- 
ments, so  that  even  when  recommend- 
ing  Christianity    you   cannot    forbear 


SHELLEY'S  LETTERS.          ii 

breathing  out  defiance  against  the 
express  words  of  Christ.  What  would 
you  have  me  think  ?  You  accuse  me, 
on  what  evidence  I  cannot  guess,  of 
guilt — a  bold  word,  sir,  this,  and  one 
which  would  have  required  me  to  write 
to  you  in  another  tone,  had  you 
addressed  it  to  anyone  except  myself. 
Instead,  therefore,  of  refraining  from 
"judging  that  you  be  not  judged,"  you 
not  only  judge,  but  condemn,  and  that 
to  a  punishment  which  its  victim  must 
be  either  among  the  meanest  or  the 
loftiest  not  to  regard  as  bitterer  than 
death.  But  you  are  such  a  pure  one 
as  Jesus  Christ  found  not  in  all  Judea 
to  throw  the  first  stone  against  the 
woman  taken  in  adultery  ! 

With  what  care  do  the  most  tyran- 
nical courts  of  judicature  weigh 
evidence,  and  surround  the  accused 
with  protecting  forms;  with  what  re- 
luctance do  they  pronounce  their  cruel 
and  presumptuous  decisions  compared 


12        SHELLEY'S  LETTERS. 

with  you  !  You  select  a  single  passage 
out  of  a  life  otherwise  not  only  spotless 
but  spent  in  an  impassioned  pursuit  of 
virtue,  which  looks  like  a  blot,  merely 
because  I  regulated  my  domestic  ar- 
rangements without  deferring  to  the 
notions  of  the  vulgar,  although  I  might 
have  done  so  quite  as  conveniently  had 
I  descended  to  their  base  thoughts — 
this  you  call  guilt.  I  might  answer 
you  in  another  manner,  but  I  take  God 
to  witness,  if  such  a  Being  is  now 
regarding  both  you  and  me,  and  I 
pledge  myself  if  we  meet,  as  perhaps 
you  expect,  before  Him  after  death,  to 
repeat  the  same  in  His  presence — that 
you  accuse  me  wiongfully.  I  am 
innocent  of  ill,  either  done  or  intended  ; 
the  consequences  you  allude  to  flowed 
in  no  respect  from  me.  If  you  were 
my  friend,  I  could  tell  you  a  history 
that  would  make  you  open  your  eyes ; 
but  I  shall  certainly  never  make  the 
public  my  familiar  confidant. 


SHELLEY'S  LETTERS.        13 

You  say  you  judge  of  opinions  by 
the  fruits  ;  so  do  I,  but  by  their  remote 
and  permanent  fruits — such  fruits  of 
rash  judgment  as  Christianity  seems  to 
have  produced  in  you.  The  im- 
mediate fruits  of  all  new  opinions  are 
indeed  calamity  to  the  promulgators 
and  professors ;  but  we  see  the  end 
of  nothing,  and  it  is  in  acting  well, 
in  contempt  of  present  advantage,  that 
virtue  consists. 

I  need  not  to  be  instructed  that  the 
opinion  of  the  ruling  party  to  which 
you  have  attached  yourself  always 
exacts,  contumeliously  receives,  and 
never  reciprocates,  toleration.  "  But 
there  is  a  tide  in  the  affairs  of  men  " — 
it  is  rising  while  we  speak. 

Another  specimen  of  your  Christianity 
is  the  judgement  you  form  of  the  spirit 
of  my  verses,  from  the  abuse  of  the 
Reviews.  I  have  desired  Mr.  Oilier  to 
send  you  those  last  published ;  they 
may  amuse  you,  for  one  of  them — in- 


14        SHELLEY'S  LETTERS. 

deed,  neither  have  anything  to  do  with 
those  speculations  on  which  we  differ. 

I  cannot  hope  that  you  will  be  candid 
enough  to  feel,  or  if  you  feel,  to  own, 
that  you  have  done  ill  in  accusing, 
even  in  your  mind,  an  innocent  and 
a  persecuted  man,  whose  only  real 
offence  is  the  holding  opinions  some- 
thing similar  to  those  which  you  once 
held  respecting  the  existing  state  of 
society.  Without  this,  further  corre- 
spondence, the  object  for  which  I 
renewed  it  being  once  obtained,  must, 
from  the  differences  in  our  juggment,  be 
irksome  and  useless.  I  hope  some  day 
to  meet  you  in  London,  and  ten 
minutes'  conversation  is  worth  ten 
folios  of  writing.  Meanwhile  assure 
yourself  that,  among  all  your  good 
wishers,  you  have  none  who  wish  you 
better  than,  dear  Sir, 

Your  very  faithful  and 

Obedient  servant, 

P.  B.  Shelley. 


p 


SHELLEY'S  LETTERS,         15 

P.S.  I  ought  not  to  omit  that  I 
have  had  sickness  enough,  and  that  at 
this  moment  I  have  so  severe  a  pain  in 
the  side  that  I  can  hardly  write.  All  this 
is  of  no  account  in  the  favour  of  what 
you,  or  anyone  else,  calls  Christianity  ; 
surely  it  would  be  better  to  wish  me 
health  and  healthful  sensations.  /  hope 
the  chickens  will  not  come  home  to 
roost ! 


1 6        SHELLEY'S  LETTERS, 

LETTER  IV. 

To  Mr.  Kitchener. 

Nantgwillt,  Rhayader, 
Radnorshire,   South  Wales, 
[Thursdayl  April  zoth,  1812. 

Sir, 

I  am  your  daughter's  friend,  of  whom 
you  may  have  heard  her  speak.  You 
will  consider  it  a  sufficient  introduction 
when  her  peace  of  mind  is  the  subject 
of  this  intrusion. 

The  late  letters  which  I  have  received 
from  my  friend  have  evinced  consider- 
able distress  of  mind,  arising  from 
reports  circulated  to  the  disadvantage 
of  her  reputation,  which  reports  appear 
not  to  be  without  connexion  with  me 
and  my  little  circle.  It  was  not  until 
we    had    determined   on   the   plan   of 


SHELLEY'S  LETTERS.        17 

living  together,  of  pursuing  conjointly 
those  avocations  for  which  we  had 
severally  acquired  a  taste,  that  any  of 
these  calumnies  reached  her  ears  :  and 
they  would  have  passed  unremarked  by 
her  and  me,  in  the  silence  of  merited 
contempt,  if  some  infatuation  had  not 
gained  them  a  sufficient  degree  of  credit 
from  you  to  disapprove  of  the  plan  on 
which  we  had  determined. 

Sir,  my  moral  character  is  unim- 
peached  and  unimpeachable.  I  hate 
not  calumny  so  much  as  I  despise  it. 
What  the  world  thinks  of  my  actions 
ever  has,  and  I  trust  ever  will  be,  a 
matter  of  the  completest  indifference. 
Your  daughter  shares  this  sentiment 
with  me ;  and  we  both  are  resolved  to 
refer  our  actions  to  one  tribunal  only — 
that  which  Nature  has  implanted  within 
us.  I  am  married.  My  wife  loves  your 
daughter :  she  laughs  at  whatever  the 
scandal  of  a  few  gossips  out  of  employ- 
ment might  whisper,  nor  is  she  willing 


i8        SHELLEY'S  LETTERS. 

to  sacrifice  the  inestimable  society  of 
her  friend  to  the  good  opinion  of  the 
good  people  of  Hurst  or  Horsham 
at  the  tea-party  or  card-table  assembled. 
So  far  as  myself  and  Mrs.  Shelley  are 
concerned,  we  are  irrevocably  resolved 
that  no  expedient  shall  be  left  untried 
on  our  part  to  induce  our  friend  to 
share  the  prosperity  or  adversity  of  her 
lot  with  us.  Much  as  the  strong  affec- 
tion which  she  bears  you  has  prejudiced 
me  in  your  favour,  yet  I  would  take  my 
own  opinion,  particularly  when  it  springs 
from  my  reasonings  and  feelings,  before 
that  of  any  man.  And  you  will  forfeit 
the  esteem  I  have  thus  acquired  for 
your  character  if  you  endeavour  by 
parental  command  to  change  the  de- 
cisions of  a  free-born  soul. 

I  understand  that  there  is  woven  in 
the  composition  of  your  character  a 
jealous  watchfulness  over  the  encroach- 
ments of  those  who  happen  to  be  born 
to  more  wealth  and  name  than  your- 


SHELLEY'S  LETTERS.        19 

self :  you  are  perhaps  right.  It  need 
not  be  exerted  now.  /  have  no  taste 
for  displaying  genealogies,  nor  do  I 
wish  to  seem  more  important  than 
I  am. 

Yours  sincerely, 

P.  B.  Shelley. 


20        SHELLEY'S    LETTERS. 


LETTER    V. 

To  Mr.  Kitchener. 

Nantgwillt,  Rhayader, 

Radnorshire,  South  Wales, 

[Thtirsdayl  May  14//?,  18 12. 

Sir, 

If  you  have  always  considered 
character  a  possession  of  the  first  con- 
sequence, you  and  1  essentially  differ. 
If  you  think  that  an  admission  of  your 
inferiority  to  the  world  leaves  any  cor- 
ner by  which  yourself  and  character 
may  aspire  beyond  its  reach,  we  differ 
there  again.  In  short,  to  be  candid,  I 
am  deceived  in  my  conception  of  your 
character. 

I  had  some  difficulty  in  stifling  an 
indignant  surprise  on  reading  the  sen- 
tence of  your  letter  in  which  you  refuse 
my  invitation  to  your  daughter.      How 


SHELLEY'S  LETTERS.        21 

are  you  entitled  to  do  this  ?  Who  made 
you  her  governor?  Did  you  receive 
this  refusal  from  her,  to  communicate 
to  me  ?  No,  you  have  not.  How  are 
you  then  constituted  to  answer  a  ques- 
tion which  can  only  be  addressed  to 
her  2  Believe  me,  such  an  assumption 
is  as  impotent  as  it  is  immoral.  You 
may  cause  your  daughter  much  anxiety, 
many  troubles;  you  may  stretch  her 
on  a  bed  of  sickness  ;  you  may  destroy 
her  body  : — but  you  are  defied  to  shake 
her  mind.  She  is  now  very  ill.  You 
have  agitated  her  mind  until  her  frame 
is  seriously  deranged.  Take  care,  sir  : 
you  may  destroy  her  by  disease,  but  her 
mind  is  free  :  that  you  cannot  hurt. 

Your  ideas  of  propriety — or,  to  ex- 
press myself  clearer,  of  morals — are 
all  founded  on  considerations  oi profit. 
I  do  not  mean  money,  but  profit  in 
its  extended  sense. 

As  to  your  daughter's  welfare, — in 
that  she  is  competent  to  judge ;  or  at 


22        SHELLEY'S  LETTERS. 

least  she  alone  has  a  right  to  decide. 
With  respect  to  your  own  comfort,  you 
of  course  do  right  to  consult  it :  that 
she  has  done  so,  you  ought  to  be  more 
grateful  than  ycu  appear.  But  how 
can  you  demand  as  a  right  what  has  been 
generously  conceded  as  a  favour  ?  You 
do  right  to  consult  your  own  comfort, 
but  the  whole  world  besides  may  surely 
be  excused.  Neither  the  laws  of  Nature 
nor  of  England  have  made  children 
private  property. 

Adieu.  When  next  I  hear  from  you, 
I  hope  that  time  will  have  liberalized 
your  sentiments. 

Yours  truly, 
P.  B.  Shelley. 


SHELLEY'S  LETTERS.        23 


LETTER    VI. 


To  Hamilton  Rowan. 

Dublin, 

7  Lower  Sackville  St., 
[Tuesdayl  February  2$/ A,  18 1 2. 

Sir, 

Although  I  have  not  the  pleasure  of 
being  personally  known  to  you,  I  con- 
sider the  motives  which  actuated  me  in 
writing  the  enclosed  sufficiently  intro- 
ductory to  authorize  me  in  sending  you 
some  copies,  and  waiving  ceremonials 
in  a  case  where  public  benefit  is  con- 
cerned. Sir,  although  an  Englishman, 
I  feel  for  Ireland ;  and  I  have  left  the 
country  in  which  the  chance  of  birth 
placed  me,  for  the  sole  purpose  of  adding 
my  little  stock  of  usefulness  to  the  fund 
which  I  hope  that  Ireland  possesses  to 


\ 

m 


0' 


24        SHELLEY'S  I^ETTERS. 

aid  her  in  the  unequal  yet  sacred  com- 
bat in  which  she  is  engaged.  In  the 
course  of  a  few  days  more  I  shall  print 
another  small  pamphlet,  which  shall  be 
sent  to  you.  I  have  intentionally  vul- 
garized the  language  of  the  enclosed. 
I  have  printed  1500  copies,  and  am 
now  distributing  them  throughout 
Dublin. 

Sir,  with  respect, 
I  am  your  obedient  humble  servant, 
P.  B.  Shelley. 


SHELLEY'S  LETTERS.        25 


LETTER  VII. 


TO   THE 

Chevalier  James  de  Laurence. 

Lynmouth,  Barnstaple,  Devon, 
August  I'jth,  181 2. 
Sir, 

I  feel  peculiar  satisfaction  in  seizing 
the  opportunity,  which  your  politeness 
places  in  my  power,  of  expressing  to 
you  (personally,  as  I  may  say)  a  high 
acknowledgment  of  my  sense  of  your 
talents  and  principles,  which,  before  I 
conceived  it  possible  that  I  should  ever 
know  you,  I  sincerely  entertained.  Your 
Empire  of  the  Nairs^  which  I  read  this 
spring,  succeeded  in  making  me  a  per- 
fect convert  to  its  doctrines.  I  then 
retained  no  doubts  of  the  evils  of  mar- 
riage— Mrs.  Wollstonecraft  reasons  too 


26  SHELLEY'S  LETTERS, 

well  for  that  ;  but  I  had  been  dull 
enough  not  to  perceive  the  greatest 
argument  against  it,  until  developed  in 
the  Nairs^  viz  :  prostitution  both  legal 
and  illegal. 

I  am  a  young  man  not  yet  of  age, 
and  have  now  been  married  a  year  to 
a  woman  younger  than  myself.  Love 
seems  inclined  to  stay  in  the  "  prison  ; " 
and  my  only  reason  for  putting  him  in 
chains,  whilst  convinced  of  the  unholi- 
ness  of  the  act,  was  a  knowledge  that 
in  the  present  state  of  society,  if  Love 
is  not  thus  villainously  treated,  she  who 
is  most  loved  will  be  treated  worse  by  a 
misjudging  world.  In  short,  seduction, 
which  term  could  have  no  meaning 
in  a  rational  society,  has  now  a  most 
tremendous  one:  the  fictitious  merit 
attached  to  chastity  has  made  that  a 
forerunner  of  the  most  terrible  of  ruins 
which  in  Malabar  would  be  a  pledge 
of  honour  and  homage.  If  there  is  any 
enormous    and    desolating     crime    of 


SHELLEY'S  LETTERS.        27 

which  I  should  shudder  to  be  accused, 
it  is  seduction. 

I  need  not  say  how  much  I  admire 
Love;  and,  little  as  a  British  public 
seems  to  appreciate  its  merit,  in  never 
permitting  it  to  emerge  from  a  first 
edition,  it  is  with  satisfaction  I  find  that 
justice  has  conceded  abroad  what 
bigotry  has  denied  at  home. 

I  shall  take  the  liberty  of  sending 
you  any  little  publication  I  may  give  to 
the  world.  Mrs.  S.  joins  with  me 
hoping,  if  we  come  to  London  this 
winter,  we  may  be  favoured  with  the 
personal  friendship  of  one  whose  writ- 
ings we  have  learned  to  esteem. 
Yours  very  truly, 

Percy  Bysshe  Shelley. 


28        SHELLEY'S   LETTERS. 


LETTER      VIII. 


To  Mr.  Hume. 

Pisa, 
February,  \*jth,  1820. 

Sir, 

I  regret  exceedingly  that  a  mistake 
occasioned  by  a  temporary  pressure  of 
affairs  should  have  caused  the  annuity 
awarded  to  my  children  to  have  re- 
mained a  quarter  in  arrear.  If  you 
will  take  the  trouble  to  present  the 
enclosed  note  to  my  friend  Mr.  Smith 
of  the  Stock  Exchange  any  day  after 
the  25  th  of  March,  that  quarter,  to- 
gether with  the  quarter  in  arrear,  w^ill 
be  paid  ;  and  such  measures  are  taken 
as  will  prevent  any  possible  future  mis- 
understanding on  the  subject. 

Allow  me  to  take  this  opportunity  of 


SHELLEY'S  LETTERS.        29 

enquiring  into  the  present  state  of 
the  health  and  intellectual  improve- 
ment of  my  children.  I  feel  assured, 
although  I  have  not  the  pleasure  of  a 
personal  acquaintance  with  you,  that 
you  will  excuse  and  comply  with  this 
request  of  a  father  who  is  the  victim  of 
the  unexampled  oppression  of  being  for- 
bidden the  exercise  of  his  parental 
duties  ;  suffering  in  his  own  person  the 
violation  of  those  rights  and  those  ties 
which  until  this  instance  the  fiercest 
religious  persecutions  had  ever  con- 
sidered sacred.  I  only  advert  to  my 
own  wrongs — for  the  hour  of  redress  is 
yet  to  arrive — that  I  may  anticipate  the 
gratitude  which  I  shall  owe  to  yourself 
and  Mrs.  Hume  for  the  kindness  and 
attention  with  which  you  doubtless 
perform  all  those  (duties  I  can  hardly 
call  them)  to  my  unfortunate  children, 
except  those  which  none  but  a  parent 
can  perform.  I  doubt  not  when  they 
shall  be  restored  to  me  but  that  the 


30        SHELLEY'S  LETTERS. 

period  which  they  have  spent  under 
your  care  will  be  remembered  both 
by  them  and  by  me  as  having  in 
some  degree  softened  the  inevitable 
ill  of  this  unnatural  separation. 

Pray    render     acceptable     to    Mrs. 
Hume  my  best  compts. 

I  remain,  Sir, 

Your  obliged  and  obedient  servant, 
Percy  B.  Shelley. 


SHELLEY'S  LETTERS. 


LETTER    IX. 


To  William  Laing. 

London, 
September,  2^1/1,  18 15. 

Mr.  William  Laing, 

Bookseller,  Edinburgh. 

Sir, 

On  unpacking  the  books  which 
arrived  from  Edinburgh,  I  discover  the 
following  have  been  omitted,  doubt- 
less thro'  mistake : 

Drummond's  Academical  Questions. 

Euripides  Hippolytus  (Marsh.) 

Euripides  Heraclida  Elmslen. 

Hoogeran  de  Porticulis. 
I  should  feel  myself  much  obliged  if 


32         SHELLEY'S  LETTERS. 

you  would  send  these  books,  which 
have  undoubtedly  been  mislaid  and 
confounded  with  yours — addressed  to 
me  at  Mr.  Hookham,  Old  Bond 
Street. 

Your  obedient  Servt. 

P.  B.  Shelley. 


SHELLEY'S  LETTERS.         33 


LETTER    X. 

26  Marchmont  Street, 

Brunswick  Square, 

April  24M,  1 8 16. 

Dear  Sir, 

In  reply  to  the  proposal  made  by  you 
some  months  since  to  me  on  the  part 
of  Dr.  Bethune,  I  wrote  the  other  day 
to  say  that  I  would  sell  him  the  rever- 
sion at  a  fair  price.  In  answer  to  your 
request  as  to  the  nature  of  the  title  I 
can  convey  accept  the  following  state- 
ment. The  estates  of  which  this  of 
Dr.  Bethune  is  a  part  are  given,  by 
settlements  dated  August  1 791,  to  my 
father  for  life  to  me  in  remainder.  On 
my  father's  death  by  recovery  I  obtain 
the  fee  of  these  estates.  I  can  make  a 
deed  which  shall  be  binding  upon  my- 
self in  case  I  survive  my  father,  and 
which  shall  be  binding  upon  my  infant 


34         SHELLEY'S  LETTERS. 

son  if  I  do  not  survive  my  father,  either 
to  alienate  any  particular  estate,  or  to 
pay  a  certain  sum  of  money.     I  have 
levied  a  fine  and  acquired  this  power, 
which   I  believe  is  called    a  base  fecy 
which  as  I  have  before  stated  I  am 
fully  competent  to  convey.      If  I  and 
my  infant  son  should  die  before  my 
father  the  security  falls  to  the  ground. 
But  Dr.  B.  or    any  person   might   in- 
sure  my   life    against   my    father's   to 
whatever  amount  he  should  be  bene- 
ficially interested.     He  need  sustain  no 
loss  in  any  case  ;  and  would  only  fail  in 
his  object  of  obtaining  possession   of 
the  farm  in  question,  if,  what  is  very 
improbable,  my  father   should  survive 
not  only  me,  but  both  myself  and  my 
infant  son. 

Dear  Sir, 
Your  very  obliged  servant, 
Percy  B.  Shelley. 


PM.3-^3J 


H'r 


